


Elloth

by sunryder



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: (Ish) - Freeform, Alternate Universe - Dragons, Dragon Rider Bilbo Baggins, M/M, Slow Burn, Smauglock
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-05
Updated: 2016-02-08
Packaged: 2018-05-11 20:42:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5641216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunryder/pseuds/sunryder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Um, Mister Bilbo. There’s a bit of a problem here.”</p>
<p>“Yes Halfred, I’d noticed that.”</p>
<p>"These Sackville-Bagginses don’t make me a bit worried, Mister Bilbo. The dragon eyeing up your begonias does raise a few concerns though.”</p>
<p>Bilbo whipped around, some part of him hoping that Halfred had donned a different personality and decided to play a prank on him. But no, there was a dragon hunkered down outside of Bag End’s front gate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back! This was my Nano fic for last year, and I finally feel good enough about it start posting. Just fyi, I plan on posting every Monday for the next (long) while. I hope you enjoy!

“This is beyond ridiculous!” Gandalf accentuated the outburst with a furious puff on his pipe, which was a bit ridiculous itself since every last trace of smoke—and more than a few singed leaves—just blew back in face. At the speed Shadowfax was flying little more than Gandalf’s tone made its way up to Shadowfax’s ears, but the Wizard had other ways of making his displeasure known. The moment he’d settled onto Shadowfax’s lean back he’d pulled down his hat and tugged up his collar in preparation for the smoke, but he looked more like a petulant child pouting away than a righteously fuming Wizards. 

Shadowfax couldn’t quite blame Gandalf for the irritation, since the last time they’d invited Saruman to an egg hatching the old bastard had actually come. The experience had been miserable for everyone in the whole mountain, whether they were actually subjected to Saruman’s presence or not. Shadowfax was fairly certain that Vellaer, King of the Dragons, had only sent Gandalf on this errand to punish him for one of the numerous untoward things he’d grumbled over the last few days. It was through a mix of Shadowfax’s own great speed and mercy that they were taking the slightly longer route and flying over the Shire in the hope that the sight of his beloved Hobbits below might actually turn around Gandalf’s foul temper before he said something unpardonable to the White Wizard. 

At this moment it would be good to note that Shadowfax had long since stopped believing in luck. He was old enough to know that they were all the servants of some will higher than their own, and that truth didn’t bother him nearly as much as it bothered some of the other dragons and riders who were all certain they made their own fates. But despite his own certainty, and the Wizard on his back, sometimes fate still managed to surprise him. 

Shadowfax slammed to a midair stop, too stunned to be gentle. He gave a few flicks of his feathery wings to keep himself hovering in place as he closed his eyes and took a few long sniffs to be sure he was smelling what he thought he was. He could hear Gandalf’s indignant squawking, and feel the scramble as the Wizard untangled himself from his travelling cloak, and hear the demands to know if Shadowfax had intended to buck him off. 

But the smell, that scent was far more interesting than pandering to the wounded dignity of a Wizard.

“Have you lost the little of your mind that wasn’t already ruined by gnawing on barrels of pipe weed?” Shadowfax gave a huff. Honestly, confuse a Wizard’s pipe weed for chewing tobacco once, two hundred years ago, and he’d never let you forget it. 

For all that Gandalf wasn’t his Rider, Shadowfax had spent centuries with the Wizard. They knew one another as well as two unbonded people could, which meant that when Shadowfax looked over his shoulder, the Wizard knew precisely what he was thinking. “No. No, no, no, no. We’re flying over the Shire. Unless you think you’ve caught a whiff of Ranger roaming around in those woods there are no Riders for you to scent here!” 

Once every few years—yes, few, because never let it be said that Dragons would ever do anything so mundane as lay their eggs on a schedule—Searchers went abroad to find those they believed would be good companions for the Draclings who were about to hatch. When that time was come, different Dragons were sent to sniff out all the potential Riders within the whole of Middle-earth, while one in particular was assigned a quick pass over the open space of Eriador and Bree. Shadowfax was too old and powerful to be sent out on a search, but the scent of Rider was ingrained in his blood as it was in every other Dragon. He didn’t need practice to know that tucked safely away in those green hills was a Rider in the first flush of adulthood, ready to be plucked and brought to their Dragon. 

“No, no, no!” Gandalf chanted while Shadowfax dove. “You’re being ridiculous! This is the Shire! There are no Hobbit Riders! There never have been, and there never will be!”

“I recall you rambling about how Hobbits were special folk who never ceased to amaze you.” 

“Their adaptability does not change their nature!” Gandalf tried to shout over the sudden rush of wind, but still he clung tight to the joints of Shadowfax’s wings and the Dragon could smell his excitement on the air. Shadowfax skimmed across endless fields of green crops, drawing in deep lungfuls of scent. He parsed out the vegetables and livestock, slipped past the ancient fear and childish glee at the sight of him, and focused on that one scant scent that called to him, deep in his bones. 

The Rider smelt like early-morning hyacinth, summer rain on an earthen roof, and the bitter bite of grief. Whatever Gandalf might have said to try and convince him to leave this small creature be, content in the peace of his homeland, that gnawing edge of pain told Shadowfax that he was needed here. This Rider needed to find his Dragon, whoever that Dragon might be. 

Shadowfax twisted to the north, and Gandalf shouted up at him, “You ought to head to the south! The Tooks live that way, and any Hobbit Rider will come from their lands.” Shadowfax ignored the Wizard and followed his nose every so slightly to the northeast, then began his real descent on the town appearing before them. “This is Hobbiton! You won’t find your potential Rider here!” 

Judging by the stench of terror and the shrieks of Hobbits diving back into their homes and leaping into ditches (as though a Dragon wouldn’t be able to see them there) Gandalf was right about most of these creatures. 

But over the valley, across the lake, and up on a little hill, Shadowfax could smell it. The Rider wasn’t paying a lick of attention to the Dragon taking up the sky and coming for his door, no, the young Rider was too busy shouting at a fellow Hobbit to pay Shadowfax any mind.


	2. Chapter 2

“I don’t care what you think you’re entitled to, Lobelia! You’re wrong! This is my home and neither you, nor your husband, nor your useless son will ever have it!”

 

Lobelia hissed at him like a startled cat. “You are underage Bilbo Baggins! That means that no matter what delusions of grandeur your mother planted in your head, you have to abide by the same rules as the rest of us. According to the law you are to be placed under the care of your closest relative, and that relative is my husband!”

 

Lobelia shook the legal documents in Bilbo’s face like that would quell him. He batted the stack to the side and declared, “I am _30 years old_ , not some fauntling who needs someone to tuck them in at night! My parents left Bag End and all their possessions to me, legally, as part of their wills. No matter what paperwork you think you have, you can’t just waltz into my house while I’m still mourning their passing and say that all they spent their life building is now yours.”

 

Lobelia puffed up in affront, somehow managing to make her cherished umbrella expand in sync, but Otho forced himself between his wife and his young cousin. He shoved a scolding finger in Bilbo’s face. “Don’t you talk to my wife that way, boy!”

 

Bilbo reared up on the balls of his feet. “This is my house and I’ll speak to her any way I want!”

 

The Sackville-Bagginses had turned up on Bilbo’s front stoop just after elvensies, fully intending to take up Bag End and become the head of the Baggins family by luncheon. It seemed that while Bilbo had been keeping to himself, trying to maintain some semblance of normalcy after the death of his father hard on the heels of his mother, that Otho and Lobelia had been doing their research. They’d found an old law, something meant for Hobbitlings and only to be employed when there was a dispute about which branch of the family would be best for looking after an orphaned child and their interests. The thought of guardianship being employed to take over the life of a thirty-year-old Hobbit who’d been the one running his family in the years since before his mother had gotten sick and his father had lost the will to do much more than read ancient histories and smoke his pipe, was beyond ludicrous.

 

And yet, here were the Sackville-Bagginses. The proud spokeshobbits for all things ridiculous.

 

A few daft Hobbits had followed the couple to Bag End thinking that if they threw their support behind Lobelia, she’d reward them with some of the finer things that Bungo and Belladonna had collected during their lives. But most of the crowd who’d gathered on the road had come to watch Bilbo vent his considerable temper on interloping relatives who thought grief would be enough to break the favorite and fiercest grandchild of the Old Took.

 

Considering that nearly the whole of Hobbiton was watching them shout at one another, Bilbo supposed that he could be forgiven for how long it took him to realize that the crowd had grown by two. (Yes, one of those two was a Wizard, and the other was a Dragon, but eavesdroppers were still eavesdroppers, no matter their species.)

 

The moment Halfred Gamgee had caught sight of the Sackville-Bagginses, the other Hobbit had taken up position behind Bilbo’s right shoulder and kept a threatening hand on his rake while he glowered at the intruders. Bilbo didn’t realize he had that extra bit of company until Halfred cleared his throat right beside Bilbo’s ear. “Um, Mister Bilbo. There’s a bit of a problem here.”

 

Bilbo whirled on his old friend. “Yes Halfred, I’d noticed that.”

 

Sweet, steady Halfred didn’t even bother to raise his eyebrow at being the subject of Bilbo’s temper (though in the back of his mind Bilbo made a note to bring the fellow scones tomorrow to make it up to him). “These Sackville-Bagginses don’t make me a bit worried, Mister Bilbo. The Dragon eyeing up your begonias does raise a few concerns though.”

 

Bilbo whipped around, some part of him hoping that Halfred had donned a different personality and decided to play a prank on him. But no, there was a Dragon hunkered down outside of Bag End’s front gate.

 

The creature was massive. He had short arms and legs, putting him at nearly the height of two particularly tall Hobbits—or the height of that one massive Ranger Bilbo had to keep on the front lawn when they had tea. But the Dragon was lean, and so long that the end of his tail disappeared down the hill and out of sight. He had a two short horns that barely jutted out of the mane of feathers that trailed down the back of his long neck before spreading out to give him bird-like wings. Other than that, the creature was very nearly sleek, its body streamlined with a blend of smooth feathers and slick scales. Bilbo couldn’t quite say whether the scales were palest blue or so light a grey they were nearly white, but for either color he could imagine the Dragon melting into the sky when he chose, invisible to the naked eyes below him.

 

Of course, Bilbo was so caught up in watching the creature move that it took him a perilously long time to realize that it was moving towards him. While, under normal circumstances, Bilbo would’ve shrieked and gotten himself as far away from the approaching Dragon as possible, today his temper was truly and officially lost.

 

The Dragon pressed into its back legs and like a snake and stretched his length over the gate, up the rise, and past the cowering Halflings to press his nose right up against Bilbo’s chest and take a great, heaving sniff. The pull of it was enough that Bilbo could feel himself lean forward onto his toes while the buttons of his waistcoat strained at their stitching. Without a second thought Bilbo smacked the great brute across its snout and shouted, “Stop that! Honestly, what sort of civilized person goes around smelling other people?”

 

The Dragon reared back at the blow and stared down at Bilbo in fascination. It took him a long moment after Bilbo’s speech to realize he was supposed to respond, and the creature murmured, “I’m a Dragon.”

 

“Being non-humanoid is not an excuse for failing to abide by the rules of polite society.”

 

“Are you scolding me?” The Dragon quirked its flat lips in something like bemusement.

 

“I should think that was obvious.”

 

“It is indeed. I just wanted to make sure Gandalf had noticed.”

 

“What are you… Gandalf?” Bilbo took a wide step around the Dragon’s snout and found the old Grey Wizard hovering at the base of his steps. Bilbo ignored the relatives either glowering at him or cowering from the Dragon who ignored them all in favor of watching Bilbo. Instead, he flew down the steps and shouted, “Gandalf!” leaping into the Wizard’s arms.

 

“My dear Bilbo,” he murmured, clutching the young Hobbit to his chest. “I am so sorry for the loss of your father. I wish I could have been here for the funeral.”

 

Bilbo gave his best shrug in the Wizard’s embrace, trying to pretend that the words did not mean so much to him. “You were there for Mum, and we all know you liked her best.”

 

Bilbo said the words as a tease, but Gandalf still felt the need to tilt the Hobbit back and look him in the eyes. “I knew your mother best out of the three of you. Though I am certain that you and I will be spending much more time together.”

 

“And what makes you say that?” Lobelia spat, ruining the moment. “As my ward I refuse to let Bilbo have a thing to do with you riffraff.” She grabbed Bilbo by the back of his jacket to haul him up the steps and into Bag End, but he wrenched around and smacked her hands away.

 

“Don’t touch me!”

 

“Don’t shout at my wife!” And they devolved back into the argument they’d been having before the Dragon ever arrived.

 

They went on like that for a few minutes before the Dragon leaned back down and positioned his head at Hobbit height to join the conversation. “If I may, I believe I have a solution to your problem.”

 

Lobelia squeaked, having completely forgotten that there was Dragon listening in. She struck out with her umbrella and the Dragon looked offended for a moment before he opened his jaws and snapped up the umbrella, fluffy ruffle, wooden handle and all. When it looked like Otho was going to summon up all his insanity and scold the Dragon, the creature gave a long, slow lick of his lips. “I was speaking to Bilbo.”

 

From one blink to the next, every last Hobbit cleared out a five-foot ring of space around them.

 

Bilbo crossed his arms and glowered at the snout in front of him. “I don’t _have_ a problem.”

 

The Dragon hmmed, a sound deep and low that vibrated into Bilbo’s chest. “Are you certain? Because it sounds as though your relatives are about to steal your house and your possessions out from under you.”

 

“They aren’t. They just think they are.”

 

“I have no doubt that you will do everything in your power to stop them from stealing your treasures. But are you sure you’ll be able to?”

 

Bilbo didn’t hesitate. “I’m not a child. They have no right to take my home from me.”

 

“Many evils have been done in the world by those who have had no right to do them. That is the way of things.”

 

“It is not the way of the Shire.”

 

The Dragon slipped forward, eye to eye with Bilbo and loomed in as near as it could to murmur, “Are you sure?”

 

Betraying none of the doubt circling his mind, Bilbo puffed out his chest and demanded, “And what sort of solution do you think a undomesticated _Dragon_ might be able to offer?”

 

“I have protected my hoard for nearly nine hundred years. I know a thing or two about guarding treasures.”

 

“I doubt a Dragon’s tactics would work for me.”

 

“Tactics are for the young and foolish. I am neither.” Bilbo couldn’t help his interest, and the Dragon quirked up the corner of its mouth like it knew it had Bilbo intrigued. “Every Dragon has a spell on their hoard that protects it from all those save the ones the Dragon has invited in. I could cast that spell over your home and these strange creatures and their useless weapons would be kept out.”

 

Haven forbid the Sackville-Bagginses ever utilize anything resembling sense when they were dealing with Bilbo. They both shrieked about dark magic and witchcraft and not having any of that sort of thing around a Baggins. The Dragon reared up on his hind legs and glowered down at Bilbo’s relatives as officially the tallest thing to ever grace the Shire. “I am Shadowfax Windwing, highborn of the Dragon kin, trusted advisor to the Dragon Council. My egg was laid in the shards of the fire mountain Thangorodrim, and whatever evil there might have been in my bloodline was destroyed in the War of Wrath when every last member of my species became servants of the light. To accuse me of darkness is to cast a blight upon all my kith and kindred and no matter how small or how ignorant you might be, I will not permit it.”

 

Never let it be said that Lobelia Sackville-Baggins was a clever creature. Because while anyone with sense would’ve looked up at the Dragon hissing down at them through clenched fangs and kept their mouth shut, Lobelia chose to shout. “Don’t think you can fool me! You and all your kind are nothing but demons pretending to look after our borders so you can eat us when the time is right, and that’s all you’re going to do to poor, deluded Bilbo.” Gandalf put a hand on Shadowfax’s flank to keep him from rearing forward and snapping up the Hobbit in recompense, but Lobelia didn’t take the warning for what it was. She hefted up one fat, scolding finger and waived it in the Dragon’s face.

 

“Don’t think I don’t know what you’re going to do to him. I’ve heard the stories.” Which meant that she’d never actually read a book anytime in the last ten years. “Dragons don’t do anything out of the goodness of their nonexistent hearts. You’re going to pretend to protect his house in exchange for something from him, and when he can’t deliver, you’ll eat him!”

 

Lobelia sucked in a deep breath to keep shouting, then the Dragon made a strange noise and everyone froze.

 

A few of the Hobbits who’d come out of hiding to gawk at what they thought were Lobelia’s last moments dove back under bushes and behind hedgerows, thinking that such a noise had to be mean something awful. It was an odd rumbling that came deep from the Dragon’s belly, and it took Bilbo a long moment to realize that Shadowfax was laughing.

 

The Dragon threw back his head and gaffawed like he was drunk at the Midsummer party and someone had just told him the best joke he’d ever heard. Only Gandalf knew what the Dragon was laughing about, and he took pains to press his lips into a thin line so his thick beard might conceal his mirth (it couldn’t do anything about the crinkles in his eyes though).

 

“I won’t tolerate my wife being mocked!” Otho shouted. And really, at this point even their most diligent of supporters were wishing they had the sense to keep their mouths shut.

 

“When your wife says such ridiculous things mocking is the least of what she deserves.”

 

“Ridiculous—” Otho sputtered.

 

“Why would I waste my time seducing such a measly mouthful as a Hobbit?” Shadowfax asked. “Bilbo wouldn’t even be enough for an appetizer. Certainly not nearly enough to be worth destroying thousands of years of peace just to eat. And, he’s far too clever to be a meal even if he was bigger. No, I’d rather speak with Bilbo than eat him.”

 

“You honestly mean to deny that you have nefarious plans for our Bilbo?” Lobelia interceded when it looked like her husband was stymied.

 

Shadowfax leaned down, looming into Sackville-Baggins space. “Even worse than nefarious. I plan to take _our_ Bilbo on an adventure.”

 

“What sort of adventure?” Bilbo asked before his relatives could sidetrack the conversation again.

 

Shadowfax turned back to Bilbo, the other Hobbits firmly shunted to the side of his attention. The Dragon drew a deep sniff, starting at Bilbo’s toes and sliding up to his curls before he pronounced, “You smell like a Dragon Rider, Bilbo Baggins.”

 

Most of his neighbors gasped, while one Chubb of particular courage scoffed, “Hobbits don’t ride Dragons.”

 

“Correction: no Hobbit has _yet_ to ride a Dragon. And I cannot guarantee that Bilbo will become the first. But no matter what comes next, he smells like a Rider.”

 

The crowd of Hobbits devolved into a cesspool of shouting. Some about how they’d known Bilbo was a strange one all along, while others said the Dragon would be taking their Master Baggins over their dead bodies. Gandalf raised his voice to calm the furor and explain that it was Bilbo’s choice to go or not, but Shadowfax kept his eyes on the Hobbit in question.

 

Because Bilbo, Bilbo looked nauseous.

 

It was Halfred who made himself heard above the din. “But Mister Elloth was here last week and he didn’t say a thing.”

 

If possible, Bilbo looked worse. Shadowfax didn’t need his nose to know Bilbo was sharp with the scent of fear. The little Hobbit knew something the others did not, and something he was more than desperate not to explain. “It’s probable that he couldn’t smell it.” Shadowfax leapt in before anyone could ask a question. “I have a better nose than Elloth. Though if he didn’t smell the Rider in Bilbo this time, he certainly would have for the next hatching.” That was an out and out lie, and Shadowfax was almost surprised the earth didn’t swallow him whole for daring to utter it.

 

Elloth was among the greatest of their species. If rumors were to be believed he had lived and fought in the War of Wrath itself back at the end of the First Age. His own distaste for leadership was the only reason that in the intervening 6,000 years Elloth had not taken upon himself the Kingship over all Dragons – though every time one was deposed there were secret whispers that someone was trying to talk him into assuming the position. Instead Elloth roamed far and wide across the reaches of Middle Earth. Some said he was still welcomed by the Valar to fly across the Sundering Sea and see the Undying Lands.

 

Three hundred years ago Vellaer, the current King of Dragons, had attempted to show his strength by appointing Elloth the lead Dragon in charge of Searching through the realm of Gondor. Elloth had gone precisely once, and informed the Steward that not only was his son not suited to be a Rider, the man ought to lock the lad up to save them all the time and trouble of the evil the teen would do when he was grown.

 

Needless to say, complaints had been filed and Elloth had been shuffled off to the vast nothingness of Eriador until the Stewards either regrew their sense, or the line of Isildur reclaimed their throne.

 

Which meant that when the call had gone out bidding the searchers to do their duty, Elloth ought to have roamed in from the wilds long enough to fly over the Shire and be certain that he smelled no Rider. But it seemed that Elloth had done a bit more than that. Here was a Hobbit with wide eyes that begged Shadowfax not to say another word. Shadowfax didn’t need the prod from Gandalf to know that something was afoot.

 

Bilbo didn’t smell confused in the slightest, which mean Elloth had told him he was a Rider. But somehow the Hobbit and ancient Dragon had agreed to leave him behind. And all of that was nothing in comparison to Elloth the Furious being referred to by Hobbits as _Mister_ Elloth.

 

“If you wanted to steal Bilbo away from home with your Rider nonsense then you ought to have waited until that next time!” Lobelia shouted. “At least Mister Elloth knew to leave well enough alone because a Hobbit would never do such a thing. Especially an underage Hobbit! As Bilbo’s guardian I won’t let him participate in any of this nonsense!”

 

The blind terror that had first seized Bilbo’s expression was mixed with an adamant denial that a Baggins of Bag End could never, _ever_ do such a thing. But hard on the heels of that was an impulse Bilbo had been doing his best to put aside ever since his mother fell ill. His whole life he’d been the sort of Hobbit who ran about looking for Elves and trailing home fireflies. But his father had needed him when mother took a turn, so Bilbo had put aside all that longing for something beyond his little Shire.

 

Shadowfax could see that Bilbo had done the practical, responsible thing when Elloth had asked him if he’d like to go, but that decision was much harder to hold to when he was given a chance to rethink it.

 

Bilbo shook his head, as if he was trying to shake off the very idea itself. He was a Baggins of Bag End, he couldn’t just go running off with a Dragon.

 

Shadowfax tilted his head to the side as if to ask, “Why not?”

 

Bilbo glowered at such a ridiculous question, but it was much harder to ignore when he’d spent the last week looking around at this little life and wondering if perhaps he really hadn’t made the wrong decision. Truly, why not? His father had left behind the mortal world to be with his mother, he had no sweetheart, and if one more person looked at him with that horrible pity in their eyes he was going to scream. In truth, if Bilbo went on like this, something in him was going to snap. Someday he was going to wake up and not recognize the Hobbit he saw in the mirror. He’d find himself staid and dull with no thought of the world outside his door. He was a fully-grown Hobbit, but—as his mother always used to say—grown didn’t have to mean boring.

 

But still, it was a fool thing for a Hobbit to do. There had never been a Hobbit Rider before, and if there was a lick of sense in the strings of fate there never would be. Shadowfax leaned in, and with a voice deep enough that Bilbo could feel it rumbling through his ribs said, “You will always wonder what might have happened if you’d gone.”

 

It was absolutely absurd and utterly true, all at the same time. Without Bilbo saying a word, the Dragon released a joyful bellow to the sky. The sound cut through all the Hobbits and Wizard, silencing them just long enough for Shadowfax to bid Bilbo to go pack a bag, and keep in mind they were heading north. He’d lay the spell while Bilbo worked.

 

Inside Bag End Bilbo neatly packed—“Speed is no excuse for dishevelment, young Bilbo,” his father would say—several jackets with his thickest trousers and shirts. In the top he tucked away the sturdiest of his braces, his winter gloves, and the lush, grey scarf his mother had knitted for him at their last Yule all together. Wrapped in the center of the bundle of clothing was his best-bound empty journal and enough ink to fill every last page with narrow, even lines cataloguing every last moment. He could admit to himself that it certainly helped his packing that he’d spent the last week thinking about all the things he would have brought if he’d gone. (Or perhaps, if fate was kind, what he might bring along if Elloth ever came back to him.)

 

Outside his windows the crowd was almost silent, save for the rumbled chanting of Shadowfax from the hill that rested atop Bilbo’s home. He wasn’t quite sure how, but he could feel something dripping from the Dragon’s words; it was a power that was almost like the smell of warm bread emanating from the kitchen and spreading through the house. Bilbo assumed it was something to do with the protection Shadowfax had offered to keep Bag End free of unwanted visitors. Whatever he was doing, it felt warm and safe, and that was good enough for Bilbo.

 

Soon enough, Bilbo stumbled out his front door, cloak wrapped around his shoulders and bag slung across his back. “Ah, Bilbo!” Gandalf shouted before any of the Hobbits could interfere. “Before Shadowfax completes the spell you need to let him know if there is anyone you want to grant entrance to while you’re away.” According to Gandalf, anyone Bilbo invited in to Bag End would be welcomed there permanently, though the invitation could be retracted at a later date. (That was how people managed to get into Dragon hoards: the Dragon got tricked into welcoming someone in, and that someone left with a pile of gold.) Much to the rage of his relatives, Bilbo only extended permission to the Gaffer and his wife.

 

“Bilbo Baggins, have you lost your mind? You don’t even know where this Dragon wants to take you! Or to do with you! You don’t even know him!”

 

“I haven’t a clue, and it’s no concern of yours, Lobelia. I’d rather run off with a Dragon then stand here one more second and listen to you! I’m going with his Dragon and I’m going to have an adventure, and you are never getting your grasping paws on Bag End.”

 

Whatever else she might have said was drowned out by jovial goodbyes from the whole Gamgee family, and more than a few of Bilbo’s Took relatives. Shadowfax sunk down to his belly and Gandalf hoisted Bilbo up before he had the chance to even try and mount the Dragon for himself. (Considering that he doubted he would’ve been able to manage the trick with anything resembling grace, Bilbo was secretly grateful for the inference, though he scowled at Gandalf all the same.) With a firm plant of his staff as a vault to push himself up, Gandalf slipped up behind Bilbo, and just like that, they were in the air.

 

With three strong strokes of his wings, Shadowfax had them in the sky, clear of Hobbiton. He hovered there for a moment before growling something fierce and triumphant that had more than a few of the Shirelings diving back into hiding. A few Hobbits cheered for Bilbo, which was what the Dragon had been intending. And then they were gone. Up into the sky, free of the demands that had been hounding Bilbo for the last few days as he refused to give in to the Sackville-Bagginses demands.

 

Bilbo tilted his face up towards the sun and spread his arms wide to feel Shadowfax move beneath him as they climbed higher and higher in the sky. When they finally leveled off and Gandalf pulled out his pipe for a furious bout of contemplative smoking, Bilbo forced himself to exert some of that Baggins practicality and ask, “Right. Where are we going?”


	3. Chapter 3

When Bilbo was a boy he’d read every last book on Dragons that was to be found within the bounds of the Shire. Given that it was the Shire, that had amounted to half a dozen storybooks where all the Dragons were villains. It had been Bilbo’s darling father who’d actually gotten him a text worth reading.

 

Every time the Dragons went out looking for Riders, Elloth was the one with the thankless task of coming to the Shire. The vast majority of Hobbits were simultaneously terrified and respectful of Elloth – much like how they treated Great-Grandmother Banks. Bilbo’s own father had been no different, inherently swinging a bit more towards the terrified end of the spectrum. But the Tooks threw a feast every time Elloth came on his search, so after his marriage Bungo Baggins was forced to swallow down the urge to run screaming every time he saw the Dragon. However, he still managed to spend every feast as far away from the Dragon’s side of the party as he could manage.

 

But for Bilbo, Bungo put on his finest coat, brushed his curls, and one warm spring night strode across the meadow and asked Mister Elloth if perhaps he might happen to know where Bungo could get some books on Dragons for his son. Little Bilbo just found them all so fascinating, Mr. Elloth, and Mr. Gandalf had only brought Bilbo back more storybooks when he asked – though they were of far more levelheaded storytelling than the ones he could get on his own, and Mr. Elrond in Rivendell had invited them to come look at his personal library, but he didn’t let his books leave his borders.

 

Elloth had called over Bilbo to ask what kind of books he might like to read, and then had been back inside of a week with Bilbo’s own copy of what the head librarian had called the best text for a beginning researcher. In the years since, Elloth had brought Bilbo what books he could, when he could, each time making sure they were copies so that Bilbo would never have to worry about sending them back.

 

(Lord Elrond had once written Bilbo to ask if perhaps he might be able to borrow one of Bilbo’s texts. Apparently for the last millennia since that particular history was recorded there had only been one copy in the whole of the world, until Elloth had persuaded the librarian to make a second for Bilbo. Elloth had given it to Bilbo when his mother died, then let the Hobbit weep into his scales, where the tears could slip away like rain water and leave behind no trace to make Bungo feel even worse.)

 

All that knowledge meant Bilbo could tell from Shadowfax’s relentless speed that he was a wind Dragon. Most folk in Middle-earth were familiar with the stories of the Fire-drakes, the fierce _Uruloki_ like Glaurung the Father of Dragons, and Ancalagon the Black, both terrible creatures who wreaked havoc across the whole of Middle-earth before they were killed and the Dragons were freed from Morgoth’s service. They could, as their name implied, breathe fire and were immune to its effects. Bilbo didn’t know if Fire-drakes were actually more numerous than the other kinds of Dragons, or if they were simply the ones talked about most often. But either way, it was rare for a person not affiliated with the riders in some way to know that fire-breathing Dragons were actually just one kind of many.

 

There were the _Lingwiloki_ , better known as Sea Serpents who lived out in the deep oceans. Then there were _Cemeloki_ , which Elves called Earth Dragons and everyone else called Were-worms who dwelled in the desert and burrowed great tunnels through the sand. One of his books spoke of the _Fealoki_ , spark Dragons, though he hadn’t been able to find any corroborating evidence. The _Helcloki_ and _Suriloki_ , ice and wind respectively, were far more common, though they didn’t have nearly as many stories about them as the fire-drakes.

 

Shadowfax’s long, lean body and the sky color of his scales were enough to suggest to Bilbo that he was meant for the air. Though, Gandalf wrapping an arm around Bilbo to keep him from flying off the Dragon’s back, and the overwhelming rush of wind that drowned out all conversation were certainly sufficient to make the point. The wind didn’t help the incessant cold that was seeping into Bilbo’s bones. Apparently midsummer meant not a thing when you were travelling north.

 

The shivering got to be too much for Gandalf, and he breathed on a clear stone until the center of it lit up like a tiny fire. He slipped the stone forward to Bilbo, letting him cradled the hot rock between his palms while Gandalf wrapped his cloak around them like a little tent to conserve the heat. The old Wizard left Bilbo to the heat, more focused on giving passive-aggressive puffs on his pipe. Having Gandalf in a snit was enough to convince Bilbo to keep his questions to himself. His curiosity burned in his blood, though it didn’t do anything to fend off the cold.

 

Bilbo wasn’t at all willing to lean over Shadowfax’s lean side to see the uninhabited land beneath them, but as the day wore on the earth below gave way to sea. The trio flew hard until the peace of twilight fell upon them, and off to the west and the dying sun, Bilbo could see several small islands like pinpricks just off the coastline. Growing steadily before them was the hulking mass of Thangorodrim.

 

Once upon a time, an age ago, the massive island in the north ocean had been the three tallest mountains in Middle-earth. When the land around it crumbled and the ground was swallowed up in the sea, only the crumbled peaks were left above water. Bilbo couldn’t imagine how tall they had once been, since they were still the tallest thing Bilbo had ever seen. The peaks themselves were smashed in, like rolls that had risen too high in the oven and collapsed. Snow capped the mountain’s rims and decorated along its sides like a pine tree the morning after a snowstorm, while steam rose from each of the three hollow tops. It was as though the interior of the mountains was a kettle, hot enough that the moment their air touched the harsh cold of the north it ought to have whistled.

 

Bilbo could just barely see specks flying around the mountain, presumably Dragons. In the fading light all of them had a red-orange cast, and Bilbo couldn’t tell one color from another. There was one speck so dark a blue that the higher it went the more it faded into the dark. Bilbo imagined that if the Dragon was flying at midnight then he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between it and the starlight sky.

 

As the blue speck got closer to them, Shadowfax’s wings stuttered for a moment before he resumed his smooth stroke. Gandalf bonked himself in the face with the stem of his pipe and grumbled at the interruption, only to curse under his breath when he picked out the Dragon’s approach. “He is going to tear you straight out of the sky.”

 

Bilbo whipped around as much as he was able. “What?”

 

“Not you, my boy. Though I have no doubt that he will have several furious words for you when he realizes that you’ve run off with another Dragon. No, Shadowfax is going to bear the brunt of Elloth’s considerable temper for snatching you up.”

 

“I wasn’t _snatched_ , thank you very much, Gandalf. I chose to come of my own free will.”

 

“Do you honestly believe that will improve his mood?”

 

“Considering that I have never once seen Elloth be anything less than perfectly amiable I doubt it will be a problem now.”

 

That was apparently a foolish assumption.

 

Elloth was upon them in mere minutes. Bilbo shuffled himself up to his knees so he could wave at his old friend, but it seemed he wasn’t in a particularly waving mood. He barreled straight for them, forcing Shadowfax to twist around and get out of his path. There was only so much he could do with two riders on his back, neither of them strapped down in proper preparation for aerial maneuvers. Elloth changed his direction mid-drive, aiming straight for Shadowfax’s vulnerable back. Gandalf raised his staff, shouting at Elloth to come to his senses, while Shadowfax dove himself, hoping to outpace Elloth before he could get caught.

 

It was a fool’s errand, Bilbo knew. Elloth had once explained to Bilbo that he flew like a falcon. Bilbo had nodded along like that made perfect sense to him, then gone to one of the hunter Hobbits and asked what in the world that meant. Apparently falcons were designed to dive. They were relatively fast fliers, but no one could outpace them when they were barreling towards the ground. Shadowfax twisted again, trying to get out of Elloth’s direct path, hoping that he was hurtling down too quickly to change his own direction in reply.

 

It might have been a good plan, Bilbo couldn’t quite tell. All he knew was that halfway through Shadowfax’s twist he was plucked off the Dragon’s back. He felt the claws wrap around him and tug him gently up and away, but rather than clenching around him to hold him in place, they let him go.

 

There was a breathless moment where Bilbo hung in the air. He looked down at the ocean below him, dyed red from the burning sun and broken by the chunks of ice bobbing along like corks. Then, he started to fall. He slipped from the sky’s hold and felt his pack tug at his shoulders and separate from his back before he started to plummet.

 

Bilbo had barely summoned the breath to scream when he landed on Elloth’s back, the Dragon slowing his descent to match Bilbo’s fall. The Dragon caught him between his wings with all the gentleness of catching an egg.

 

Elloth twisted around and immediately started towards the mountain. He twisted around his long neck and demanded, “Are you alright?”

 

“I don’t think you get to ask that after you almost dropped me!”

 

Elloth scoffed, and it was strange that Bilbo could more feel the vibrations of it beneath him than he could hear the sound. “I would’ve have let you fall.”

 

“You pulled me off another Dragon’s back!”

 

“He brought you here against your wishes!”

 

Shadowfax took advantage of Elloth’s reduced speed and that he was too busy staring over his shoulder to pay attention to where he was flying. Shadowfax slipped up alongside them and both he and Gandalf glowered at Elloth like he was a naughty child. “For such a supposedly wise creature you are unbearably dramatic.”

 

“He said he didn’t want to be a Rider!” Elloth snapped both his tone and his jaws.

 

“I regretted it.” Bilbo interrupted before Gandalf had the chance to shout something that would get him knocked off Shadowfax in punishment.

 

Elloth stopped dead, a feat Bilbo hadn’t known Dragons could accomplish. His wings continued at their steady beat, but he hovered there with his ancient gaze fixed on Bilbo. “You are a Baggins of Bag End.”

 

“I’m also a Took. And Tooks go on adventures. Bagginses just happen to think about them for a while before they happen.” Elloth gave that little twitch of his lip that other Hobbits mistook for a repressed snarl and he knew to be a smile. “I had hoped that maybe when you came back in a few years I might get another chance to go with you. Or maybe by then I wouldn’t want to go anymore and could just serve you a keg of tea like my mother did. But then Shadowfax and Gandalf turned up on my front stoop and scared off Lobelia—”

 

“What was Lobelia doing there?”

 

“She was trying to gain custody over me.”

 

“Custody? You’re fully grown!”

 

“30 is not fully grown in Hobbit circles, as you well know. They wouldn’t have succeeded, but I stood there with the Sackville-Bagginses on one side and Shadowfax on the other, and I… I ached with the thought of spending the rest of my days in such a manner. And I knew that the next time you came you’d offer to take me away with you, after all, you’ve done the same every time you’ve come to the Shire since I would’ve come of age were I one of the Men.” Bilbo was so busy trying to soothe Elloth that he didn’t notice how both Shadowfax and Gandalf froze at that piece of information. Froze enough that Shadowfax actually dropped several feet in the air before he regained himself and started pumping his wings again.

 

“But they were there, and they were awful, and in truth you’ve been my best friend in the world for years now, and I… I simply rather would have been with you.” Bilbo shrugged, a sheepish expression that spoke to the clinging vestiges of his youth in a way that little else could. He was a terribly old soul, but the age of his soul did not correspond to the length of experience. “If you’d rather, I can go home. If the time isn’t right, or if things aren’t—”

 

Elloth nudged Bilbo with his snout, the perfect pressure for it to be the Dragon version of a cuddle. “There is no time or place when I would not want your company.”

 

Bilbo was far too old and proper a Hobbit to blush and smooth down his travelling jacket. And even if he wasn’t, Elloth was far too much a gentledragon to mention it. Gandalf, of course, rolled his eyes so hard he nearly launched himself right off Shadowfax’s back. “If you are quite done being dramatic for the night Elloth, might we get out of this cold? Some of us have been flying all day, you know.” Bilbo didn’t think Gandalf was in a position to scold anyone for being dramatic, but he was cold, and while he’d just spent the day sitting on Shadowfax’s back, he was still exhausted.

 

Elloth huffed, and Bilbo didn’t need to see his face to know he had rolled his eyes, but still he started towards the mountain. Gandalf grumbled the whole way about melodramatic Dragons and inconvenient Hobbits, but Bilbo was too enthralled to pay it any mind. (Ignoring Gandalf’s grumblings was a skill he’d long since perfected.) They were close enough to the mountain now that Bilbo could distinguish different features.

 

The mountain was pock-marked like the Hobbiton green after a particularly violent game of croquet. (Never let a Chubb tell you they weren’t competitive. Despite their larger-than-average size there were no fiercer sportshobbits in the Shire.) In the twilight they looked like little more than divots scoured into the mountain’s surface after thousands of years in this harsh climate. But he could see Dragons slithering in and swooping out of them like there was something behind the shadows.

 

When Bilbo asked what they were, it was Shadowfax who explained, “They are dwellings. Originally they were little more than holes made by falling debris when the mountain exploded, but after long years we have carved out homes for us all, both for Dragons and our beloveds.”

 

To Bilbo it sounded, if not really all that lovely, at least quite memorable. And cold. Definitely cold. “Beloveds?”

 

“Our Riders, their families, and those who have yet to bond with a Dragon but have proven themselves worthy of admission.”

 

“Right, Beloveds,” Bilbo repeated. That concept made sense to him, like something along the lines of extended family.

 

Shadowfax seemed to mistake Bilbo’s furrowed brow for something more severe than merely a contemplation of just how many layers Bilbo would have to wear at all times to stay warm. “You see young Bilbo, we reside on this island because it is the birthplace of us all, both old and young. Which is what brings you here. Every few years some of the Dragons feel inclined to lay an egg and hatch a Dracling. The impulse doesn’t come every cycle, and the cycles are never regular, and some Dragons never feel the urge. There’s no rhyme or reason to why certain Dragons choose to, or why we do at the same time, but that’s just how it is.”

 

“Well that’s all terribly… vague.”

 

Gandalf snickered around the stem of his pipe. “They’re _Dragons_ , Bilbo Baggins. They don’t go spilling their secrets to all and sundry they meet along the road. They whole process of egg making is kept in the utmost secrecy.”

 

“I would’ve assumed that it was much the same process as everyone else,” Bilbo responded lightly.

 

“The sex itself is usually uncomplicated, I’ll give you that. But I do believe that’s how it goes for every species. Often a Dracling doesn’t know who their other parent is, just the one who hatched their egg. And Draclings don’t prepare to hatch until they’re at the right temperature, so a Dragon parent might lay their egg and keep in in the cold for years, for centuries, before taking it to the hatching grounds at Thangorodrim. I myself only have suspicions about my other parent as my sire never wanted to reveal that information.”

 

“So you…” Bilbo trailed off with a vague gesture towards Shadowfax’s hindquarters. When Shadowfax refused to answer just to see Bilbo squirm he managed to choke out, “Have the necessary bits?”

 

“All Dragons have the ability to grow eggs, yes. And to implant seed in other Dragons.”

 

“But… you’re a male.”

 

“We Dragons are neither and both genders at the same time. All Dragons are. Our forefathers were male yes, but when we broke free of Sauron our biology changed so we could create new generations without his evil power.”

 

Bilbo longed to have a wall so he could bang his head against it. “But, I don’t, how does that work?”

 

Shadowfax settled himself in for a long explanation of Dragon biology, but Gandalf interrupted. “Let it be enough to know that you should refer to every Dragon you meet as a ‘he’ and never ask any questions about a Dragon’s parentage, Bilbo. I can promise you that no amount of the satisfaction of understanding will be worth the trauma that comes from knowing about Dragonic sex organs.”

 

“So let me make sure I’ve got this: we’re here in Thangorodrim so that I can meet a few baby Dragons and find out if one of them is silly enough to think that I should be their Rider. Is that about the size of it?” Despite all he had read on the subject—he’d asked for a book detailing the particulars after the first time Elloth had called him a rider—Bilbo felt the need to double-check.

 

“Slightly more complicated than that.”

 

“Of course it is.”

 

“If things go simply for you, you’ll be at the hatching, a Dracling will come from its shell, and come straight for you to make its life with you. If things get complicated, a Dragon might decide that you seem like a perfect match for its unhatched egg and ask that you touch the egg to see if the Dracling agrees with their assessment. Which means you might have a Dracling hatch just for you, or not. Then there are Dragons who have hatched but either their prior Riders have died, or they have never taken a Rider before. Those Dragons might decide that you’re the Rider they’ve been waiting for and choose to take you on.”

 

Bilbo tried to keep his expression placid and even, he really did, but apparently he failed miserably since Gandalf started to chortle. Bilbo had no qualms about throwing his spare coat at Gandalf’s head as punishment for finding this whole thing amusing. He diligently ignored the Wizard’s laughter while he turned his attention back Shadowfax like this was one of his particularly difficult lessons from school. It certainly helped matters that Elloth managed to twist around his tail and brush it across Bilbo’s shoulders without heading too far off course.

 

“So, we’re at your homeland for the hatching of baby Draclings. Normally they’re the ones who choose new Riders, and you think I have the potential to be one of them.” Bilbo gave an eye roll at that, and Shadowfax knew that trying to console Bilbo about his own potential as a Rider would cause him more stress than comfort, so he kept his mouth shut.

 

“However, some of those Dragons are like Tooks, and they enjoying being contrary for the sake of it, and they’ve never bonded with a Rider. Or, they’ve lost their Rider and now they’re looking for someone else to be their new Rider. Either a Dracling, an unbonded Dragon, or a widowed Dragon might try to bond with me. Do I have that right?”

 

“Perfect, Bilbo.”

 

He gave a sharp nod and dug his fingers into the vulnerable flesh at the base of Elloth’s wings. Neither Shadowfax nor Gandalf interrupted while Bilbo murmured to himself and ruffled a hand through his hair, making the curls all stand up on end despite the wind trying to push them back down.

 

Elloth flicked his tail at Shadowfax and Gandalf as they peeled away. Whether in goodbye or sending them off, Bilbo didn’t know, but both Dragon and Wizard made for the massive center mountain while Elloth pushed north, curving out wide over the ocean and away from his fellow Dragons rather than over the peaks and through their company. They found themselves alone on the far side of the smallest, and most northernmost of the mountains that made up the island. It surprised Bilbo to see how much a difference the direction made. Never would he have thought to call the other peaks hospitable, but with nothing between it and the Great North Sea, the stout little mountain looked so battered that Bilbo imagined it might collapse in a stiff breeze. Though, the harsh wind whipping around them belied that thought.

 

Elloth landed in a wide cavern near the mountain’s peak, fully facing the brunt of the wind. It didn’t take much for Bilbo to wonder if perhaps this home had started as something much smaller only to be carved out by nature. Between two claws Elloth gently lifted Bilbo to the ground, giving him the chance to see that despite his changing perspective the cavern was still devoid of anything resembling comfort or personality. Even the Sackville-Bagginses had chairs, uncomfortable and ugly though they were. “This is certainly… roomy.” Bilbo commented, relying on his Hobbit upbringing to find something polite to say.

 

Elloth snorted, shaking out his muscles even after so short a flight. Elloth wasn’t one for idle chatter, but he’d long ago conceded that Bilbo’s curiosity could outlast his stoicism. He knew that Elloth didn’t much like spending his time at Thangorodrim surrounded by the other Dragons, so he assumed that these were temporary quarters only assigned in emergencies when the rest of the mountain was full.

 

Instead, Elloth explained in his driest tone. “Traditionally the outside of the mountains were meant to be reserved for those who have not been granted true access to our people—visitors and the like—while the heart of Thangorodrim it is lined with the homes of all those dear to Dragon kind, but still open to the sky so that all might take flight.”

 

“And you’re here so rarely you count as a visitor?”

 

“So they say. But in truth, I am simply not one of the King’s favorites. Since he would rather I never be here, my accommodations are the least comfortable in the mountain.”

 

“Not the _least_ , surely.”

 

“After several millennia do you believe we haven’t made a study about the best and worst places to sleep? You told me once that you and your cousins knew who your grandmother was upset with based upon the room she assigned you when you came visiting.”

 

Bilbo hummed in contemplation, but he had no argument against that. Bilbo toured the too-large space, as though there was actually something there to break up the untouched rock. Bilbo had once helped his sickly father tour a freshly dug Smial. (Anyone who had seen Bag End sought out Bungo Baggins’s advice on building. There was no better architect in the whole of the Shire.) Bilbo remembered the empty halls, nothing but uncovered dirt and beams keeping the structure in place. The windows hadn’t even been carved out yet because the young Hobbit wanted Bungo’s opinion on where they might be best placed, and whether any of the halls ought to be extended or widened. (About which Bungo had provided his opinion, then sat the young Hobbit down and told him that the person he ought to be asking was his future bride. The home would be hers too, after all, for as long as Yavanna above would grant them.)

 

Elloth let him roam, aimless and all feigned curiosity until not even Bilbo could pretend that there was something actually there for him to look at. In the interim Elloth had curled up in the back of the room, in what Bilbo supposed was the least windy corner of the space. “You can ask me, you know.”

 

“About why you don’t even have wood for a fire?”

 

“You know I can’t blow fire, Bilbo. Don’t pretend to be daft, it doesn’t suit you.”

 

“Well, I did run off with a Wizard and a Dragon today, so I’ve clearly gone around the bend.”

 

Elloth, with all his long years of experience, refused to be baited. If he engaged, Bilbo would find a way to keep them engrossed in increasingly off topic subjects until the moment had passed entirely. He’d gotten Bilbo privacy so they could properly discuss what had him all tied up in knots, and he wasn’t going to let Bilbo squander it.

 

“What Shadowfax was saying, that’s all theoretical isn’t it? None of these Dragons are actually going to try and choose me for a Rider, are they? The hatched ones will instinctively know better and the sires won’t let the Draclings choose a Hobbit of all creatures. Will they?”

 

Elloth wrapped his tail around Bilbo’s waist and dragged him into the shelter of his Dragonic bulk, circling himself into a little nest to keep Bilbo self from the wind. “All I can promise you is that no Dragon would choose you if they found you unworthy to be their bonded Rider, and no Dragon would force you to choose them if you truly did not want it.”

 

“Promise?” Bilbo snuggled in tight to Elloth’s side, pulling out his bedroll and trying his best to blow some more heat into the crystal Gandalf had forgotten to reclaim.

 

Elloth snorted and stretched his wing over the little space Bilbo occupied, bottling in what heat he could. “Why would anyone want to spend their life with someone who hates them?”

 

“I haven’t the foggiest, but Lobelia wanted to assume guardianship over me to get Bag End and all my belongings.”

 

“There was material gain to be had from that, Bilbo. Not to mention how much pride the Sackville-Bagginses would take from being masters of Bag End. It would the topic of every conversation every last one of them had for the rest of their lives. The butcher would mention the new roasts he had in stock, and Lobelia would say she didn’t know why he would bother selling them to anyone else, only Bag End had an oven large enough to cook them properly.”

 

Bilbo snickered at Elloth’s poor attempt to imitate Lobelia, his low, gravelly voice not up to imitating her high, shrill, tone. “Or when Geraldine Grubb wins the annual pie contest she’ll praise the pie because, “That’s the same color blue as the walls at Bag End, my dear.”

 

“And then Geraldine would smash the pie straight in her face.” Bilbo giggled at the image because it was so perfectly true that he didn’t even have to stretch to imagine it.

 

When Bilbo’s giggles had calmed, Elloth twisted his head under his wing, like some overlarge cat so he could look Bilbo in the eye as he said, “I will swear to you on whatever you’d like, there is no Dragon in existence who would consider Bag End a hoard worthy of betraying our ancient oaths and forcing you into a bond.”

 

Something in Bilbo unclenched and he puffed out a relieved sigh. “You promise?”

 

“On all that I hold dear, Bilbo.”

 

Of course, Elloth left out the rather important detail that ‘not bonding’ did not mean that a besotted Dragon wouldn’t follow Bilbo around until he decided that he did, in fact, want to be a Rider for this Dragon and couldn’t imagine another day without him. And, on occasion when a Rider had refused to bond for years, Dragons had been known to follow them home and do all their duties and protection whether or not they had their bond. But little details like that wouldn’t be of much comfort to Bilbo, so Elloth left them out.

 

After all, there was no point in worrying him when Elloth would put himself between Bilbo and any Dragon fool enough to make him uncomfortable. And there were very few Dragons in creation who would dare go against him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do so love voice casting my stories, so here:
> 
> Smaug (because we all know he'll turn up eventually): Benedict Cumberbatch
> 
> Shadowfax: Patrick Stewart
> 
> Elloth: Jude Law
> 
> (And yes, I am aware who Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman play, and yes, I am also aware who Jude Law plays, and yes, that did factor into my decision-making process.)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In my defense, it's still Monday in my part of the world.

Bilbo was exhausted. That sort of numbing tired that worked its way into your temples and settled there, gnawing away while it kept you from getting the sleep you needed to make the pain go away. Although, for Bilbo, as for any good Hobbit, the pain in Bilbo’s head didn’t come near outweighing the pain in his stomach, but that was a problem to be handled in the morning.

As it was, Bilbo took more than a bit of comfort at being curled up with Elloth. It was the same way they’d slept when little Bilbo would sneak out to visit him in the Woody End forest on the rare occasions that he came to visit.

 

Grandfather Gerontius would roam out with a whole bundle of Tooks to pay his respects, every time inviting the Dragon to settle himself someplace closer to the smials. And every time Elloth would decline, citing that he preferred the protection of the forest. And every time little Bilbo would tuck himself under a wing, or behind a tree, and wait until everyone but him made their way back indoors. Bilbo’s mother and father knew full well where he was, but despite the Dragon being terribly large to such a young Hobbit—and to a fully-grown one as well—they trusted Elloth to take care of their boy. (In truth, there was probably nothing that had ever dwelt anywhere from the Woody End to the Old Forest that had ever been more terrifying than Elloth. And if anyone would know, it would be the thousand-year-old Dragon.)

 

But no one in their little family of three wanted word to get out that Bilbo was having sleepovers with a Dragon. Bungo and Belladonna because the fewer elements of their parenting that the Bagginses could scold them for, the better; Elloth, because he didn’t want the whole Took and Brandybuck bloodlines out sleeping with him; and Bilbo, because Elloth was _his_ , and he’d never been particularly good at sharing the things he was fond of. (A flaw of his being an only child rather than an actual deficiency of character, he was sure.)

  
The others would leave, and Bilbo would settle into the curl of Elloth’s body, rambling every last thing that had happened to him since the last time Elloth had been by. They’d stay up until what felt terribly late to a young Hobbit, when Bilbo finally ran out of breath Elloth would murmur stories about the fantastical places he’d been in the time between their visits. Bilbo couldn’t imagine what stories Elloth might have to tell him tonight since it had been little more than a week since they’d seen one another last. On this particular night it wasn’t the exhaustion, or the rambling words, it was the old memory of being wrapped tight in Elloth’s scales.

 

Elloth was a striking shade of midnight blue, like the color of the midsummer sky between the flashes of Gandalf’s fireworks. To be tucked away with Elloth was to feel like you were wrapped up in a blanket full of stars.

 

Bilbo could trace the scales’ transition from deep blue at the edge to dark brown at the base, from sky to the the color of healthy earth ready for planting. Unlike the sparkling sheen of Shadowfax, Elloth’s scales were matte, absorbing the light rather than reflecting it. When he sat at the edge of the feast thrown in his honor he faded away into the dark of night, the glow from the bonfires doing little to illuminate him unless you were truly looking. And there were few Hobbits who dared to look. Most were happy to forget that the guest of honor was there at all, and Elloth and his taciturn disposition were more than happy to let them.

 

Bilbo had long thought that Elloth had been sent to the Shire for that very purpose, the only representative for his whole species who wouldn’t constantly be terrifying his charges. Elloth had snorted when Bilbo suggested it, but hadn’t offered any alternative, so Bilbo had been content to assure the more skittish of his people that the Dragons were doing everything they could to make the process easy on the Hobbits. (The first time Bilbo had told them that, Elloth had glowered so fiercely that some of Bilbo’s fellows had been concerned they were about to get gobbled up. Which just made Bilbo offer even increasingly untenable theories about why Elloth had been chosen to come to them. Eventually Elloth had started laughing, and the sound terrified them all away.)

 

The sleek scales that covered every inch of Shadowfax’s flesh that wasn’t connected to his feathered wings were about the size of Bilbo’s hands, while Elloth’s scales were few and far between, and what he had could’ve covered a barrel of pipe weed. Most of his skin was tough leather, meant, he said, for different climes and flights than his scaled brethren. Bilbo supposed he would have the chance to verify that explanation in the coming days. Or at least find a new theory about what gave one Dragon scales and feathers, and another skin that Bilbo had only once dared to liken unto a cow’s hide. (When his mother found out there’d been a long lecture, while his father explained, “You wouldn’t want him comparing your skin to a peach, would you?” Bilbo had written Elloth an apology note and baked him an I’m Sorry cake, though he was certain it was the tears streaming down his face, heartbroken at the thought that maybe Elloth wouldn’t want to be his friend anymore that actually did the trick.)

 

Fully grown but back sleeping with Elloth as he was, it was easy for Bilbo to wonder how in the world he found himself here once again when not a week ago he swore up and down to Elloth that he’d never be a Rider. For the first time in his life Bilbo had found himself meeting Elloth, not as young Bilbo and his strange friend, but as the head of the Baggins family entertaining the Dragon emissary, which meant he’d spent the whole of the Welcoming Feast safely tucked away at the back table reserved for the most curmudgeonly of the old Hobbits.

 

He twitched with the urge to run over to Elloth as he once did, to wrap himself up in the Dragon’s warmth and let him soothe away the ache of Bungo’s loss as he had done for Belladonna’s. But he was already dogged by a thousand whispers about how perhaps he wasn’t ready for the challenge that came with being the head of a family. Bilbo didn’t much want to be the head of Baggins, but he was more than a bit insulted that he’d been the de facto head for ears and years and _now_ that he needed something to keep him busy was when it struck their attention that perhaps Bilbo ought not have such pressure.

 

In the hope that his tomorrow might be better than his yesterday, Bilbo sat at his picnic table as far away from Elloth as he could get. He shot Elloth one apologetic grimace across the distance, and clever as her was, that was enough for Elloth to understand why. Though that didn’t stop Elloth from shooting Bilbo speaking glances every time one of his species did something half-mad and entirely deserving off the Dragon’s expressive eye rolls.

 

Bilbo ignored the gnawing certainty that this would be the extent of his interaction with Elloth until, like a blessing from Yavanna the Green, his cousin Dudo popped up to drag Bilbo off to help him visit the Dragon.

 

Only the Hobbitling went tumbling to the ground when Bilbo refused to budge. “I’ll be staying right here, thank you very much.”

 

“But Bilbo,” Dudo whined, scrambling up from the grass to flop himself into Bilbo’s lap. “I want to see the Dragon and none of the other Bagginses will go with me.”

 

Bilbo knew full well that every Hobbit at the table and more than a few who just ‘happened’ to be walking by were eavesdropping on the conversation, so despite his relief, he played to his audience. “You can see the Dragon just fine from here.”

 

“That’s what my mother said.” The boy jutted out his lip like Bilbo was naïve enough to be fooled by such a face.

 

“Perhaps you ought to listen to your mother then.”

 

“But Bilbo, it’s a dragon!” The boy gave up trying to woo Bilbo with sad eyes. “Who knows when he’ll come around again? The next time he’s here I might be too old to want to see him, like you!” Someone really ought to have a conversation with Dudo about the proper methods for trying to convince someone to agree with you. Subtlety was a Baggins trait that seemed to have skipped over Dudo.

 

Bilbo was more than a little tempted to ask the boy why, if Bilbo was so unforgivably old, he was pestering Bilbo about the dragon rather than bombarding his Bolger cousins, or seeing if perhaps he could persuade his older siblings that dragon-gawking was a respectable habit for a Baggins. It was unlikely that any one them would agree, but honestly, the lad should’ve believed he had a better chance at convincing them then he did Bilbo. Yes, Dudo’s older brother, Drogo, had been born with a stick lodged firmly up his behind, and his elder sister, Dora, believed that conversation was to be avoided at all cost unless it was in epistolary form. And perhaps, Bilbo might occasionally still like to entertain his young relatives with stories from his Elven books, but to the boy none of that ought to mean he was as disreputable enough to actually _want_ to seek out a dragon.

 

And yet, despite all common sense, Dudo stood right up in Bilbo’s lap, grabbed his cousin’s shoulders and shook with as much force as his tiny fists could get him. “Please, cousin Bilbo! Please, please, please, please! I want to see the dragon.” Honestly, if Bilbo had been a good elder he would’ve smacked the lad on his bottom and sent him right back to his parents with a strong reprimand for such bad behavior. Instead, Bilbo chuckled, ignoring the displeased grunts and grumbles of the Hobbits who shared his table, and picked the lad up. Now if anyone asked, it was Bilbo’s tender heart for his tiny relatives that would be blamed for his conversation with Elloth.

 

Dudo bounced himself right out of Bilbo’s grip and pulled the older Hobbit along behind him in an anxious scramble to see the lounging dragon. He liked to sprawl himself out at the edge of the Tuckborough fields, giving himself plenty of space to take off should he be needed, and still giving the Hobbits all the room they needed to have their party. (After all, feasting and dancing and drinking took up quite a bit of space.)

 

Elloth tracked Bilbo’s movement across the party, massive head unmoving as his ancient eyes kept Bilbo in his sight, as though he thought something terrible would happen if he blinked. Bilbo bit back his guilty blush at the certainty that his mother would’ve been terribly disappointed in him for not putting aside his austerity and coming over to see Elloth straight away.

 

As was often the case with Hobbitish displays of courage, Dudo’s failed him before he actually reached the dragon. His tiny feet went from a bound, to a trot, to a shuffle, to hiding behind Bilbo and gripping his pant leg as he stumbled along behind. Elloth was well acquainted with the fragile egos of young, male Hobbits, and didn’t chuckle at the pair of eyes he could see peeking out from behind Bilbo.

 

Even blending into the dark as he was trying to do, Elloth was massive. Standing upright he was nearly the height of three fully-grown men, and three times that in length from nose to tail. However, on this particular night, surrounded by half-drunk Shirelings, he made a concerted effort to stay as much on his belly as possible to keep anyone from being too startled. Though, despite his best effort to be an unintimidating as possible, he was still a dragon. Elloth had a row of short spikes along his jawline (there to protect the vulnerable place where his jaw connected to his throat, Elloth had once explained to Bilbo), and a set of thick, curved horns that looked more suited to a ram than a dragon. When Elloth shifted forward to drop his chin to the ground to try to exchange hellos with Dudo, the starlight glinted off the edges of his scales, like he’d fallen from the night sky when no one was looking.

 

“And who might you be?”

 

Dudo squeaked and ducked the whole of his body back behind Bilbo, accidentally nudging his cousin forward in his desperation to get back out of sight. Bilbo chuckled and twisted to rest his hand on Dudo’s head and offer him a gentle smile. “This is my cousin, Dudo Baggins.”

 

Whatever else Elloth was, he was not one for subtlety. The dragon stretched his long neck around Bilbo and peeked at the boy. “Hello, Dudo Baggins.” Dudo squeaked and buried his face in the small of Bilbo’s back, which anyone with manners would take as a sign to leave the boy be for a moment so he could recover, and Elloth took as a sign to come even closer. He nudged his snout against Dudo’s shoulder and whispered, as much as a dragon _could_ whisper, “You are the first Baggins I’ve seen tonight. I was worried.”

 

Dudo didn’t quite remove his face from the protection of Bilbo’s jacket, but he did roll his face ever so slightly to the side so he could expose one eye to peek at the dragon. “Why was I worried?” Elloth asked without waiting for the boy to summon the courage to speak. “Because I happen to be particularly fond of Bagginses, and I don’t like the thought that Bagginses might not be fond of me.”

 

Dudo murmured something into Bilbo’s skin, and Elloth twisted his head to cock his ear towards the child. “I do apologize, I’m afraid I’m getting quite on in years and didn’t catch that. Could you say it again?”

 

“We like you… it’s just, you’re a _dragon_.”

 

Elloth reared back to his hind legs and twisted around in a frantic circle like a dog chasing it’s tail. “What? I’m a dragon? Why didn’t anyone tell me?” Dudo dissolved into a puddle of giggles, with Bilbo not far behind.

 

Bilbo’s laughter faded faster than Dudo’s. Elloth was watching Bilbo with that small, sad smile that Bilbo’s parents sometimes got when they couldn’t believe how fast he was growing. Bilbo stroked a hand across Elloth’s snout and got a thorough nuzzle for his trouble, the Dragon equivalent of a hug. “I have missed the sound of your laughter.”

 

“And I have missed the sound of your voice.”

 

“Are you friends, Cousin Bilbo?”

 

“My dear boy, every Hobbit worth the name is friends with Mister Elloth.”  


“Really?”

 

“Of course!”

 

“Even, even after you’re sure you’re not a Rider?”

 

Bilbo flinched, but managed to get out, “Even then.”

 

“And am I-- am I a rider?”

 

Elloth gave Bilbo another nuzzle before he leaned close and gave a dramatic sniff at Dudo, the pull of it dragging up his curls and making the boy giggle away his nerves. Bilbo appreciated the pretense since he new from experience that Elloth could’ve smelled a potential Rider from miles and miles away. “I do not believe so. Although, I cannot say for certain until after you come of age.”

 

“Why?”

 

“It is part of the magic that began bonding Riders and Dragons in the first place. It was meant to give Riders a chance to grow as they will, without the interference of a Dragon, and to be strong enough that they may stand up to their Dragon like they would any friend they think is wrong.”

 

“So you can’t tell until I’m Bilbo’s age?”

 

“Bilbo’s age or even older. A Dragon can smell you as a Rider only when you’re ready.”

 

Dudo asked a string of questions about what it was like to be a Rider, and soon enough Dudo felt the need to tell every Hobbit he could find about Elloth’s fantastic joke, and with a chipper wave went running off to tell them all. Bilbo watched the boy go, his hands tucked away in his pockets. He couldn’t yet bring himself to turn around and face his old friend, but neither could he walk away.

 

Elloth took the situation out of Bilbo’s hands by softly resting his head atop Bilbo’s. “There are no words in the language of my people to express my sorrow at the loss of your father. He was a true friend, and I miss them.”

 

“It must be difficult to live so long and lose so many you care about.”

 

“It has been many long years since I let myself get attached to one who lives for such a short amount of time. It is easier to ignore the possibility than burying them so often. But no matter how many years it has been, or ever shall be, I still miss my sire.”

 

“Sire?”

 

“In your terminology, he was both my mother.”

 

Bilbo tilted his head back to try and get a glimpse of the dragon above him. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

 

“I would tell you that it gets easier with time in the hope it might comfort you, but it would be a lie.”

 

Elloth slowly wound his way around Bilbo, tucked his head underneath the curve of his belly to look Bilbo straight in the eye without towering over him. Bilbo slouched against the Dragon’s side and Elloth took in slow and steady breaths, like he was drinking Bilbo in.

 

“Did you have another parent to take care of you when your sire was gone?”

 

“We Dragons are not ones for

 

“We Dragons are not ones for committed, monogamous relationships. Sharing our hearts and our Draclings are beyond our capability.”

 

“Then where do baby Dragons come from?”

 

“ _Draclings_ ,” Elloth emphasized. “When one dragon loves another dragon very much—”

 

Bilbo thumped Elloth’s snout with the flat of his hand. “Don’t be cheeky.”

 

“But Bilbo, if I am not cheeky, then I shall not have anything to say,” Elloth teased.

 

“Just the facts, you great lumbering tease.”

 

Elloth raised one scaled eyebrow at all the ways he could twist those words, and Bilbo blushed when he realized just what had come out of his mouth. Thankfully, Elloth just snorted. “Every Dragon has both the ability to impregnate and to get pregnant. However, unlike most of the species of Middle-earth, the creation of an egg must be something that the sire chooses. Were I to create an egg, I would decide who I wanted to be the other contributor to my Dracling, and choose that when we mated my body would create an egg.”

 

“The other parent doesn’t get a say?”

 

“It is almost unheard of for dragons to form permanent mated pairs. I would not be choosing another parent for my Dracling, I would choose someone for their speed, for their strength, for for their beauty so that my child might have those traits. Not someone to make my life with.”

 

“Does that mean you don’t have any Draclings? Or do you not know?”

 

Elloth snorted and a gust of wind ruffled his hair. “Someone must mate with you for there to be Draclings, Bilbo.”

 

Why no one would mate with Elloth was a thoroughly inappropriate question, and one that Bilbo was far too much of a Baggins to ask. Instead, he straightened himself out of the comfortable sprawl that somehow he’d found himself in against the dragon’s side. After an uncomfortable clearing of his throat and unnecessary straightening of his vest, all the while with Elloth just watching him in amusement, Bilbo managed to eep out, “That sounds terribly complicated.” He wanted to say there was a comfort in having no parents while Elloth had no children, but it made him feel like a terrible person so he kept it to himself.

 

“Is that not always the way of things? Things that sound unbearably complicated to you, are simply life for me. And things that pass as everyday to you,” at this Elloth paused to unwind himself so Bilbo might see the Hobbits and Hobbitesses who were quite obviously waiting for Bilbo to come back to the party so they could flirt with him. “These things make no sense to me.”

 

Bilbo flinched away from the obvious attention at what was supposed to me a private moment between Bilbo and a friend of his parents. “I have a fine house,” he murmured. “A fine house, with many rooms for many children who might carry on the Baggins name.”

 

Elloth ‘hmmed,’ a lone sound that Bilbo could feel echo through his ribs and soothed him like a cat purring in his lap. “That your nest might be full of Draclings, and that your line might grow long and proud, there are few greater blessings a Dragon could ask for.”

 

Bilbo nodded along, his gaze still off in the middle distance and ignoring the dull throb that came to his chest whenever someone mentioned that now Bilbo was of age it was his responsibility to marry and pass on the family name. “Of course, Dragons also consider it the greatest of blessings to live before hatching an egg. There’s so much sky to travel, and wind to soar, and clouds to taste that one should no pass up the opportunity.”

 

Bilbo slouched against Elloth’s side, burying his face in surprisingly soft scales while the dragon slipped his wing around Bilbo’s shoulders. He couldn’t breathe for the thought of what it might be like to _fly_. To see all those places he’d heard about in his books before he tied himself to one of these Hobbits who were too scared to step outside the safety of their party and come see Elloth up close. Before he gave in to the demands of practicality and became just like them.

 

Bilbo wrapped himself back into a tight knot and pulled away, straightening out his vest as he went. “But I am not a dragon.”

 

“Oh Bilbo Baggins,” Elloth almost sounded sad. “You have more Dragon in you than you realize.”

 

“Considering my mother, at least half of me must be a bit Dragon.”

 

They chuckled, but from Elloth the sound petered out. “Your mother was a fierce lady, to be sure. But your strength is your own. I do not wish to burden you with this Bilbo, given all that has happened to you in recent months, but I am bound by duty and by magic to tell you once again, you are a Rider.”

 

Bilbo stumbled back from the Dragon who watched him go with sad eyes. “Now you’re just being cruel. Hobbits aren’t Riders. I’m not a Rider. I can’t be, no matter how many times you tell me.”

 

“It doesn’t matter what Hobbits are or aren’t, Bilbo. It matters what _you_ are. Or rather, what you want to be.”

 

“And what does that mean?”

 

“I have told you time and time again, I am only sworn to tell you that you have it in you to be a Rider, but I am not obliged to bring you with me. That is your choice to make.” Elloth’s wing tightened around Bilbo’s shoulders. “You know what awaits you here, Bilbo. And you know that if you leave you will find a Dragon of your own and bond with them. You will make a life beyond anything you ever dreamed of here.”

 

“Tell me again.”

 

“The bond is a soul deep connection between a Dragon and his Rider. It strengthens them both, steadying the Dragon in the heat of battle and lending fire to the Rider’s soul.”

 

Bilbo cleared his throat. “And the baby Dragons choose a Rider right then and there? What if they aren’t fond of any of the Riders they have to choose from? Are they just stuck spending the rest of their lives with a Rider they don’t like?”

 

Bilbo was thoroughly affronted on behalf of these Draclings. Partly because he knew the trials and travails of a life you did not choose, and partly because it would give him an easy way to explain why—despite his newfound freedom—he was still too terrified to accept Elloth’s offer. (It wasn’t that Bilbo was scared, it was that he didn’t agree with the treatment of the baby Dragons.) Elloth knew full well what was behind the accusation. “A Dragon knows their Rider, Bilbo Baggins. Whether the Rider comes to them while they are still in their egg, or if they are a thousand years old. A Dragon knows their Rider.”

 

Bilbo popped to his feet, shoving away the warmth and safety he felt weaving around his bones at the sound of Elloth’s voice. “Well as fascinating as that sounds, I really do have responsibilities here in the Shire, and I can’t just up and leave them behind.”

 

Elloth snuck his tail around Bilbo’s waist as the Hobbit tried to flounce back to the party. “You have responsibilities to yourself, Bilbo.”

 

“I am a Baggins of Bag End! We don’t go running off to strange mountains with Dragons.”

 

“First, you’d hardly be running off. I’m not going to snatch you up and drag you off without letting you gather up supplies. And second, why not?”

 

“What do you mean, ‘why not’? It just isn’t done.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because that’s not what Hobbits are supposed to do!”

 

“And once again, why not?”

 

“Because I am a respectable Hobbit, and respectable Hobbits are supposed to be… respectable.” The Dragon quirked his eyebrow ridge and Bilbo snapped, “So help me, Elloth. If you say ‘why not’ one more time I will throttle you.”

 

“Bilbo Baggins, there is Dragon blood in your veins. You were born to be a Rider, and it is my wish that you might come with me to meet your fate.”

 

Bilbo had turned on his heel and stormed back to the table of curmudgeonly relatives, downing a mug of ale in one long pull before he could think better of his choice. He spent the party bouncing from relative to relative, always with his back to Elloth’s bulk. The Dragon slipped away with nary a sound, and Bilbo swallowed back the breaking of his heart that Elloth didn’t even say goodbye. Bilbo spent the week afterwards running himself ragged so he could sleep through the night. Any moment he stopped moving was a moment he wanted to weep.

 

To have Shadowfax turn up at his front door was a gift from on high, but still Bilbo’s fear nearly crippled him.

 

It wasn’t Shadowfax’s argument, or Lobelia’s ridiculousness that made him go. It was the terrible notion that the first Dragon he would ever ride wasn’t Elloth, and he’d done that to himself.

 

But now, wrapped in tightly in Elloth’s bulk, Bilbo felt like he was home. No matter the pain in his head or his stomach, they were nothing compared to the lightness of his heart.


	5. Chapter 5

Smaug the Magnificent, the Impenetrable, the Terrible, was one of the oldest and wisest of all Dragons.

 

He was one of the few creatures still living who had survived the War of Wrath, and that alone ought to command him all the respect a person could give. He had been born in Thangorodrim while it was still in its pure state. Then he had watched as the mountain was shattered beneath the corpse of Ancalagon, Greatest of All, as he fell from the sky. He had felt evil’s hold over him crumble with both the mountain and the bones of his sire.

 

In his vengeance, Smaug had led the Valar deep into the fortress of Angband to where Morgoth was hiding from his foes like a rat from sunlight. He was one of the few representatives of the free peoples of Middle-earth chosen to carry his fellow witnesses beyond the Walls of the World to watch Morgoth, the Great Corruptor, the Fallen, the Banished, be beheaded and thrust through the Door of Night and into the Timeless Void. There he would wait until the end of the world, and Smaug looked forward with glee to the last battle so he might bury his teeth into Morgoth’s flesh once again.

 

No Dragon with the sense that merely existing ought to give them ever tried to lie to Smaug, because he had lived long enough to know _everything_. Those who pretended to be older than they actually were, or to have fought battles they did not, or to have mated with those they had never met, Smaug let them spread their lies as much as they liked, so long as their untruths did not interfere with his plans. Because the moment the liars ran afoul of Smaug, they came to regret ever being hatched.

 

Of course, every few hundred years Smaug felt the need to remind the general Dragon and bipedal populace that he bore the moniker, ‘the Terrible’ for a reason. According to his own mental record, the issue ought not have appeared for another fifty years at least, but Elloth had never adhered to anyone’s expectations. (He was often referred to as, ‘the Furious’ after all. Though few creatures were old enough to remember that his moniker was due less to his personality than to other things.)

 

Elloth himself required no reminding about Smaug. They knew one another as only true predators could, and as Smaug feared none of the hatchlings would ever understand again.

 

Do not mistake him, Smaug was one of the few creatures in the whole history of Middle-earth who had lived both inside and out of Morgoth’s imprisoning influence, and he would rather have the scales and flesh peeled from his bones every day until the breaking of the world rather than be bound by Morgoth’s power ever again. But sometimes, he wondered if his people had lost something fundamental when Morgoth’s influence was excised from their species.

 

No, the trouble was not Elloth, per se, but that sometimes he spent so much time away from civilized society that he forgot how much attention the other Dragons paid him. Elloth would think nothing at all about snatching a bipedal off Shadowfax’s back and carrying it away to his cave, but everyone else would buzz like bees at the very idea, let alone how they’d gossip about being privy to the majestic sight of Elloth in full dive. As Smaug was the Magnificent when people were simpering at him, so too was Elloth the Majestic, and today the whole of Thangorodrim remembered why.

 

For all his cleverness, Shadowfax was both a help a hindrance in this situation. He’d been the one Elloth had charged mid-air to lay claim to his passenger, which meant he’d been swarmed on his way to the heart of the central peak to report precisely what had happened. Shadowfax had spent far too long with his Wizard, because his first inclination was always to conceal, wrapping himself in vagaries and pipe weed until the others were too twisted around by his words to fight back. Smaug had never once been deceived by their games, but even his sizable patience was often worn thin by the pleasure they took from hoarding information. (Smaug wasn’t sure whether Shadowfax had been born odd—that thoughts were what he hoarded rather than gold like the rest of his species—or if Gandalf had perverted him.)

 

On this particular occasion, both Dragon and Wizard were too irked by Elloth to bother playing any games. They would rather complain about his blunt-clawed approach instead of retreat to a corner and gloat about all they knew that no one else did. As much as Smaug would have rather heard it himself first and distributed the right information to the appropriate gossips, it was helpful that Shadowfax was quick to declare his passenger had been a _Hobbit_ —of all things—who had regretted telling Elloth he didn’t wish to be a Rider.

 

The story as they told it was _perfect_. There was no whisper that perhaps Elloth had actually hadn’t _noticed_ the Hobbit, and whatever stray thought anyone might have had that Elloth had been meeting his Rider for the first time was quickly squashed with prejudice, borne away with embarrassment that it had ever crossed their minds. Soon enough all attention was on this Bilbo Baggins, and how fate, it seemed, had granted him a second chance that he gladly took. The universally accepted opinion was that Elloth had attacked to make sure his Hobbit charge had appeared at the mountain out of his own free will rather than been snatched up by the beguiling words of a Wizard—which more than one Dragon could empathize with.

 

But at the same time, having the story told at all was a terrible hindrance because Elloth… well, Elloth didn’t _do_ that sort of thing.

 

For Elloth to take such a fancy to the Hobbit that he was willing to take him back to his—Smaug hated to use the word ‘den’ to describe such a pathetic dwelling, but since Smaug had been the one to ensure it was assigned to Elloth, he could only sneer at it so much.

 

In truth, the inhospitiability of the cave only made Elloth running off with the Hobbit even worse. Elloth was so fond of the Baggins that he took the little creature back with him to the cave rather than sent him on to one of the bipedal guest quarters that ought to have been much warmer. Or, if he was determined to keep the creature with him, Elloth might have settled into the communal sleeping grounds that some of the Dragons liked to share with their Riders and the others in their Wing.

 

But no, Elloth had stayed in his pitiable excuse for a den. He had retreated to the only place in Thangorodrim he could even reasonably begin to call his own, and kept the Hobbit with him. Smaug could say with certainty that the Hobbit was the first person Elloth had invited into his space since he gave up a permanent residence in the mountain, and was the first _thing_ he had brought back to make the space something more like a home. The Dragon had no tapestries, no gems, no jewels, no food, and no crafts! Merciful Valar, he didn’t even have any stones for one of the younger Fire Drakes to heat for him so that his cave might at least be warm through the bitterly cold nights!

 

And yes, Smaug knew full well that Elloth wouldn’t actually ask one of the younger Dragons to drop by and heat his stones. And yes, he knew that despite the long friendships he had with the older Fire Drakes whose flames burned so hot that the stones should stay heated for a week, that he wouldn’t ask any of them either.

 

Smaug had intended for Elloth’s stubbornness to bend just enough that he might at least _mention_ the cold to Smaug, to which Smaug would roll his eyes and fly straight off to Elloth’s sad, overly-large den, and make it warm. Elloth would object, saying that he wasn’t trying to imply anything! “Every time I come back you complain about how I might as well not be here at all because I don’t say anything! I was just making conversation!” But Smaug wouldn’t stop, because Elloth had never quite mastered the art of pursuing what he wanted. He’d spent several thousand years living in penitent silence, and seemed to think that was the only way to do things.

 

When Smaug landed at the den he’d take a look around the sad space and fix Elloth with a glare that asked his fellow Dragon what precisely he thought he was thinking. He’d perfected the glare long ago, using it when Elloth had first suggested flying across the Sundering Sea to see the Undying Lands, and he’d done it when Elloth first decided to make friends with the Eagles, and Smaug had no qualms about pulling it out when the Dragon resigned himself to living in the perfect physical representation of his own isolation.

 

Elloth would say things were perfectly fine there, and “Really Smaug, get that look off your face, it’s fine. I’m fine.” But Smaug would start dropping off trinkets to make the place sparkle, and he’d haul up some boulders that would make the place swelter like the center of the volcano that they both remembered as their first home—which would conveniently require far longer to heat than regular stones, and Elloth’s politeness would keep him sitting there for hours on end while Smaug blew fire, and perhaps he might take far more breaks than would actually be necessary for the process.

 

But none of Smaug’s meticulous planning had taken into account a _Hobbit_.

 

Smaug’s first inclination was the same as any Dragon whose hoard had been breached: rip the interloper to shreds and spread their bloody viscera for the crows to feast upon so all would know what happened to those who dared challenge him.

 

However, the Hobbit probably wouldn’t make for a very impressive display of force. They were even smaller than Dwarves, with none of their thick skin or sturdy weaponry. To kill a Hobbit would be not unlike snatching a baby bird from its nest and smashing it upon the ground. Smaug cared not one whit for bipedal notions of honor, but even he would rather make a kill that was sporting.

 

Yes, that was precisely the reason that Smaug wouldn’t go after the interloping Hobbit. It wasn’t at all because Elloth would be furious with him in a way that would take at least several hundred years to repair. After all, Elloth still wasn’t over the loss of his one and only Rider, when most of those in their age group were on their third or fourth Rider by now. (The younger Dragons were developing the unfortunate penchant to wait little more than a few decades after their Riders died before they chose a new one.) Elloth would never accept another Rider, so the Hobbit couldn’t be that, but he was the first creature Elloth had been fond of in a very, very long time, so reason suggested it would take Elloth an equitably long time to accept his loss. A time span that would only be compounded by Smaug being the one to violate his trust in such a way.

 

Smaug had a brief moment of contemplation about letting one of his young hangers-on kill the Hobbit on his behalf, but Elloth would never believe that one of the idiots had come up with the idea on their own. Or if they had, that Smaug hadn’t seen it coming and hadn’t been able to prevent it. (Really, as beneficial as it was to know Elloth so well, it was a bit of a burden to be known so well in return.)

 

Taking all these different variables into consideration Smaug could accept that he had only one option open to him: befriend the Hobbit.

 

So while Smaug settled in and listened to the spiraling gossip as though it was the highlight of his night, he reached into his chest, into that space behind his ribs and between his wings, the core of him that sparked and smoldered. The source of his fire, the source of his wit, and the root of his bond. The bond between a Dragon and his Rider was a blending of two souls after all, and to reach out to his Rider was to speak one heart to another rather than between minds as so many of the unbonded seemed to think.

 

Messages between them were only words in the most dire of situations, but instead were usually a constant hum of emotion. While Smaug had been information gathering, his Rider had spent the night in the sparring ring, going toe to toe with several of the Humans who’d come for the hatching. Much of Smaug’s own aggression had been channeled out through his Rider, who was perfectly happy to transmute their mutual frustration into blows at Humans who seemed to think a person’s height corresponded to their skill in battle.

 

Now that Smaug had control over his temper, his Rider had meant to venture down to the hot springs in the under levels of the mountain and clean off before retiring for the night. But now, Smaug had work for him to do. He sent along his determination that _this time_ his plans for Elloth would work, only to be met with a wordless grumble.

 

His Rider had the unique capacity to manage all manner of grunts and grumbles through a bond that was pure emotion. They’d been told it was a product of bonding when his Rider was so young, to which they’d shared a look so derisive it made the healer sputter and refuse to work with either of them ever again.

 

Young or not, Thorin had never had any trouble emoting his displeasure with Smaug’s schemes. He always went along with them though, just as he did tonight. After all, no one else could be trusted to keep Smaug from bringing the sky down on their heads.


	6. Chapter 6

Waking up in Thangorodrim was possibly one of the least comfortable experiences of Bilbo’s life.

 

Not because Elloth wasn’t a joy to wake up beside, but because there was stone underneath Bilbo’s back, the tiniest puff of frigid air was seeping under the blanket of Elloth’s wings, and wrapped around Bilbo like Elloth was, Bilbo could feel the Dragon shaking in the freezing cold. And there was not a thing Bilbo could do about it.

 

To say that Bilbo disliked the cold was an understatement of magnificent proportions.

 

To be clear, he didn’t mind a chill. Those were actually quite nice. Chills meant hot chocolate, and stoked fires, and walking about the house in his dressing gown, and no visitors because no one much wanted to venture outside. A chill was pleasant and private, while cold, cold was lingering and lonely. Cold was the earth and the sky being the same bleak grey. Cold sunk into your bones and took hours of diligent fussing to be rid of. Cold made you long to curl back up in your bed and hibernate until the sun came out—and not the lovely sort of tucked away in your bed like you were stealing a day just for you, but that burrowed away because today the world wasn’t something to be endured.

 

In particular, to Bilbo the sharp tang of cold on Elloth’s scales was Fell Winter, when Elloth had spent long months perched atop the hill over Bag End. He caught what little sleep he could, but none of it was restful.

 

When the Hobbits first spotted the wolves prowling along the far side of the almost-frozen river, the Old Took had sent his grandchildren into the endless storage rooms on a hunt for battle horns that hadn’t see the light of day since Bullroarer Took. The horns were distributed far and wide across the Shire to those who could be trusted to patrol properly and not panic at the first sound of branches cracking in the wind. The plan been for the horns to operate as a warning system, telling the other Hobbits to get inside while the ones brave enough to function as scouts were to climb the nearest tree as fast as they possibly could.

 

But the first time the horn had blown, the whole of Buckland was doing a terrible job getting themselves indoors. It would have been a massacre if Elloth hadn’t descended from the murky sky and took out half the crazed animals in one fell swoop of his wings.

 

The Dragon had stayed in the Shire until the ice melted, almost in constant flight patrolling their borders and driving off every foul creature who thought the Shire would be easy pickings. (Elloth told them all it was just Wolves, but Bilbo had tended to cuts in his flesh that couldn’t have been made by teeth or claws.) Without Elloth, the whole Shire might’ve been overrun, but with him not a single life was lost.

 

To Bilbo, the cold was nothing but a reminder of the gnawing fear that perhaps this time Elloth wouldn’t get there fast enough. Perhaps this time, Elloth would come home with something worse than then cuts. Maybe he wouldn’t come home at all.

 

So now Bilbo was hungry, he was cold, he was melancholy, and whoever it was pounding at the door was not doing a thing to help any of those situations.

 

“Um, Thatrunung? Are you well?”

 

Bilbo smooshed his face against Elloth’s side. “Should we tell him he’s at the wrong cave?”

 

“He’s a Dwarf.” Elloth answered with that cracking grumble that came from a voice not ready for consciousness.

 

Bilbo waited, but when nothing else was forthcoming he said, “I imagine that you think that was an answer, but it didn’t make a lick of sense to me.”

 

“That’s what the Dwarves call me.”

 

Bilbo had been hoping if he stayed firmly horizontal that either a feather mattress would spring up underneath him or that the knocking would cease. However, now that his curiosity was piqued he was significantly less interested in such an outcome. He popped up out of his bedroll and Elloth groaned now that he knew Bilbo wouldn’t be letting him go back to sleep. “What do you mean that’s what they call you? It’s not your name.”

 

“It’s my name in Dwarvish.”

 

“Is it a translation of Elloth, or do you they just call you whatever they like? Like how the Men of Bree call Gandalf the Gray Wanderer?”

 

“I don’t know. I don’t speak Dwarrow.” Elloth grumbled, but he pulled back his tail so Bilbo could get to the door without scrambling over his bulk.

 

Midway through the next knock Bilbo flung open the door and asked the young Dwarf precisely the same question he’d just asked Elloth. The Dragon buried his snout into his shoulder so Bilbo couldn’t see him smile, while young Ori stared at Bilbo with wide, baffled eyes. There were very few voices in Thangorodrim that Elloth would have allowed Bilbo to answer the door for, and Ori was one of the few. The years the little Dwarf had spent as the librarian’s assistant meant that Elloth had come into contact with him time and time again, enough that he trusted the Dwarf wasn’t lurking in the empty hallway with a knife in his hand.

 

Bilbo began tapping one clodhopper of a foot in impatience, and Ori had the sense to tell that the time before the door was slammed in his face was rapidly running out.

 

“It’s both a translation and an approximation. To use Mister Gandalf as an example, my people as a whole call him Tharkun, which translates to ‘Gray Man.’” Bilbo quirked an eyebrow at that, and Ori flushed. “I know, it’s not a particularly inventive translation, but I don’t think anyone actually knows what any Wizard’s name really means. However, most of the people who know Mister Gandalf and speak to him face to face actually call him Gandalf. It’s the ones who’ve only heard stories about him and the stuffy traditionalists who don’t want any word sounding remotely Elvish to cross their lips that call him Tharkun.”

 

“And Elloth is the same?”

 

“Yes. Only rather than picking an identifying characteristic to name him after, we actually know what his name translates to, since it’s Elvish and all.” Elloth didn’t think Bilbo actually meant for Ori to launch into an explanation of Elven linguistics and their translation into Dwarrow, but the dear boy was far too polite to tell the Dwarf that his own Sindarin was excellent.

 

“You see, ‘el’ generally means ‘star’ in certain Elvish dialects, while ‘loth’ translates to ‘flower.’ So Elloth means ‘star flower.’ We lack quite so direct a translation in Dwarrow, but for us it comes out to be ‘thatru,’ meaning ‘star of,’ and ‘nung’ meaning ‘flowers.’”

 

Elloth poked Bilbo in the back with his tail, a nudge that if he wanted to stop Ori before things got worse he ought to do it now rather than later. Elloth had inadvertently been on the end of one of Ori’s accidental lectures before but he had the opportunity of pretending he’d heard something immediate and needed to fly away.

 

“Then why did you call him Thatr—Thatrug--”

 

“Thatrunung.”

 

“Yes, that. Why did you call him that rather than his name?”

 

Ori shrugged. “It seemed polite.”

 

There was a moment of awkward silence, then it seemed the word ‘polite’ triggered Bilbo’s Baggins manners. “I beg your pardon, that was terribly rude of me. I’ve never heard Elloth called anything other than Elloth and I’m afraid I got caught up in my confusion. My name is Bilbo Baggins. It’s a pleasure to meet you Mister…?”

 

“Ori. Just Ori. I’m no nearly so important as to be a mister.”

 

“Everyone is important enough to be a mister, Mister Ori. The only people who aren’t are the ones who aren’t worth it are the ones not polite enough to use the term on other people.”

 

Ori had a delightfully charming blush that Bilbo was determined to pull out of him as often as possible. Bilbo hadn’t climbed on Shadowfax’s back with even the slightest inclination of a romantic entanglement, especially since he wouldn’t be in Thangorodrim long enough to indulge in anything serious. But a little bit of flirting never did anyone any harm. Especially when the Dwarf in question was so perfectly like a Hobbit. Yes, Ori was exactly the sort of Hobbit that Bilbo would have happily spent many a happy evening with were they back in the Shire.

 

“I assume you came by at this terribly early hour of the morning for a purpose, Ori?” Elloth interrupted, otherwise the two of them would have plunged into a never-ending circle of politeness that would have lasted all day.

 

“Oh! I did!” He shook himself out of staring at Bilbo and had the sense to lean around the Hobbit and bid Elloth an enthusiastic hello. “Bassil has been waiting all night to meet Mister Bilbo.”

 

“Just Bilbo, my dear Ori.”

 

Ori flushed that adorable pink again, tugging at the threads of his sweet little mittens. It wasn’t often Bilbo felt like the wicked one in a relationship, but he was rather enjoying it. If all Dwarves were like this Ori, then Bilbo was going to have a splendid time shocking them all with his Took bluntness.

 

“Bassil is our head librarian, and when he heard your name he was thrilled for the chance to meet you in person after all the books we’ve sent off with Elloth for you.”

 

It took Bilbo an unforgivably long moment to catch up. “Oh! Are you the one who’s been transcribing my books for me?”

 

“I have indeed. It’s been a privilege to be of use to Lord Elloth, and I didn’t think it could be any better, but now I know what a good fellow they’ve been going to, I’m even happier.”

 

“And I with you, Ori. All of the books have been so wonderful, and words can’t express how grateful I’ve been for all of them.” He took sweet Ori by his mittened hands. “Honestly. There’s so little information about Dragons to be had in the Shire, and those books made all the difference in the world to me.”

 

Elloth snorted. “I don’t believe I ever got such a thank you and I was the one who brought the books in the first place.”

 

Ever so slowly, Bilbo turned back to face Elloth, and the Dragon didn’t need to look to see the absolutely wicked grin gracing the Hobbit’s features. “I have a question for you, _Elloth_. Is the Dwarven naming convention the same one employed by the rest of the peoples of Middle-earth? Renaming you to suit their language rather than the Elves?”

 

Elloth stilled, knowing exactly where Bilbo was going with this. “Only when they’re being difficult. Most civilized people have the grace to let me go by the name I choose for myself.”

 

“Ah yes, respecting personal decisions is the highest form of friendship, is it not?”

 

“Respecting a friend’s decision should happen after the friend is absolutely certain they are doing the right thing. You don’t want a friend to make a decision only to find they regret it when you are not there to help them fix the problems they created.”

 

Had the scolding come from anyone else on Middle-earth, Bilbo would have taken it poorly. But coming from Elloth’s lips it wasn’t a scolding, it was a carefully worded warning. He said it in such a tone that Ori thought the Dragon was trying to stop Bilbo from calling him “Starflower” or some other such nonsense, but for Bilbo, it was a reminder not to run mad. He’d spent years saying he didn’t want to go to Thangorodrim and become a Rider, and now he was here. Here when just a week ago he was once again telling Elloth that Dragon riding was not to be his fate. That he was here at all was a massive leap forward for Bilbo, and perhaps he ought to be careful that none of the decisions he made in the joyous rush of running away from home would be something he would regret.

 

At the same time, Bilbo had heard stories about Hobbits who went off to Bree and forgot every last trace of their manners. As though what happened away from home didn’t actually count as bad behavior. The stories about the wildness otherwise perfectly respectable Hobbits managed to get up to always managed to make their way the few miles back home to the Shire, no matter how sneaky the naughty might think they were being.

 

Elloth was not the type to remind Bilbo to be on his best behavior so that he could avoid judgment when he got home. He considered most of the Hobbitish concerns to be rather ridiculous, so there was no way he would encourage Bilbo to behave according to their standards. No, it wasn’t so that Bilbo might have nothing to hide when he got home, but so he would have nothing to regret when he did. And perhaps, that at the same time he might not create a reason for himself not to come back to Thangorodrim.

 

It said something about the length of their friendship that Bilbo was able to parse all that out. “I promise you Elloth, I will be both a Baggins and a Took that my parents could be proud of.”

 

“Not simply that, Bilbo. But be someone _you_ could be proud of as well.” With a stern look, Elloth directed his focus past Bilbo’s shoulder. “Don’t let him get into trouble, Ori. I’m off to find a patch of sunlight so I might feel some warmth in my bones. I’d hate to come back and find out he’d been led afoul of anyone.”

 

Ori sputtered out assurances that he would never do such a thing, while Bilbo asked with genuine concern, “Do you want me to come with you?”

 

“No dear one, I’ll be fine.” Elloth leaned in and gave Bilbo a nuzzle before he took off backwards into the sky with one mighty flap of his wings.

 

“That show off.”

 

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone sass Lord Elloth to his face before.” Bilbo quirked an eyebrow, and Ori explained. “People talk _about_ him all the time. But they rarely say anything _too_ him.”

 

That hadn’t been quite what Bilbo was looking for. He was a Hobbit after all, and the understood gossip better than anyone else. “And calling him Lord?”

 

With a tug on Bilbo’s hand, Ori had them out into the hallway and bounding down what seemed to be an endless flight of stairs. “Dragon hierarchies are confusing.”

 

“That doesn’t surprise me in the slightest.”

 

“You see, there’s a Dragon King, Vellaer, who is the de facto leader of their people. It’s not really an inherited position like we Dwarves have, though. In theory it’s supposed to belong to the strongest of the Dragons, though it’s more about belonging to the strongest who actually want the position. At the same time there’s a council. That’s a bit of a hodgepodge of Dragons the King feels like he can trust, Dragons powerful enough that King wants them to feel like they’re being paid attention to, and Dragons he doesn’t like and doesn’t want, but he _needs_ because to ignore them would make it look like the King can’t actually handle their presence.”

 

“And that third group would include Elloth?”

 

“It would. Though since he’s almost never here I doubt many people are certain he’s on the Council, but common sense would make that obvious.”

 

“As I’ve discovered over the years, there’s very little about common sense that’s actually common. So Council members are generally referred to as Lords?”

 

“It’s more like the only Dragons who are _allowed_ to be called Lord, while the general rule is that the traditionalists and the ones who are in favor with the King insist on being called Lord. It’s usually in your best interest to call any member of the Council, Lord, unless they’ve told you it’s alright to do otherwise.”

 

“And how will I know the members of the Council from the regular Dragons?”

 

“Well, for one thing you’ll hear other people calling them Lord and deferring to them, but for a second thing, you’ll just know.” Ori offered that delightfully vague piece of advice as they stepped onto a balcony overlooking the interior of the same northernmost mountain where he and Elloth had slept. Bilbo had the innate underground sense that came from spending a large chunk of his youth in the Took’s Great Smials, but that sense was doing little more than helping Bilbo recognize his directions. He suspected that if was going to stay in Thagorodrim for any length of time he’d need a map to keep himself from getting permanently lost.

 

Down in the caldera below their balcony were Dragons of every size, shape, and color. Bilbo felt a bit like a fool for thinking that Shadowfax was large. Long though the Dragon might be, he was nothing compared to some of the creatures below. One Dragon circled the whole room from nose to tip of his tail he was so long, and another Dragon was so thick that Bilbo thought if he flew straight up his barrel chest would block out the sun.

 

His natural instinct was to believe that the bigger the Dragon, the older and more powerful they were. After all, Ancalagon, the greatest of all Dragons, had been massive. But from Ori’s own mouth Bilbo knew that Elloth was powerful, and he was like a Hobbit to an Ent in comparison with some of these Dragons. (Though he certainly wasn’t the smallest here, either.) Bilbo stopped looking at their size and started looking at the indefinable authority that Grandmother Chubb had, and that his own mother had possessed.

 

The barrel-chested Dragon was strong, Bilbo could tell since he was the one most of the others were paying attention to. There were two others who tried to claim the attention—both reds who were covered every inch in scales—but they were scrambling for the attention, not commanding it themselves. No, the massive fellow was the one in charge of all of them, but he was taking his orders from a small golden Dragon who was perhaps the least commanding creature Bilbo had ever seen. He was shaped like a pill bug, with a tiny dip where his neck ought to be while the rest of him was the same stuffed sausage thickness through the whole length of his body. He lounged at the side of the room like a slug, obviously not having come out with the rest of the Dragons on whatever excursion had them all panting and getting lectures on their form.

 

“The huge fellow is Ayath. He’s in charge of training and making sure the younger Dragons keep their skills up, despite us not having been at war for several hundred years.”

 

“And the golden Dragon?”

 

Ori started, like he hadn’t been expecting Bilbo to notice him. “That’s Ikoth. Ayath is his son. He’s Dwalin’s Dragon.”

 

“Dwalin, hmm?” Ori blushed furiously, elbowing Bilbo in the ribs when he caught the Hobbit’s teasing grin. “Mister Dwalin is one of the best Dwarf Riders we have. He deserves to be made a fuss of.”

 

“Of course he does.”

 

“Bilbo!” Ori huffed, then dragged him back to the hallway and down another set of stairs, rambling all the way about his brothers and perhaps they shouldn’t spend too long with Master Bassil in the library because Dori would certainly want to make sure that Bilbo was properly kitted up for the mountain, and had Bilbo been cold last night up there in that cave? Were there blankets or heat stones someplace that he hadn’t noticed? Bilbo let Ori ramble the entire way, pretending like the tangent was working perfectly to distract him.

 

Of course, Ori’s desperation to make Bilbo believe and his own sweet nature, as well as Bilbo’s own ignorance on the subject, meant neither one of them noticed the yellow eyes tracking them up the stairs.


End file.
